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SCIENCE 



[N. S. VoL.XXVin. No. 715 



Modern civilization furnishes no better ex- 

 ample than this of the possible victory over 

 pestilence and disease, when the warfare is 

 carried on in the light of modern scientific 

 knowledge. The building of the Panama 

 Canal and the sanitary record of the Japanese 

 in their war with Russia are the two great 

 object lessons of recent years, demonstrating 

 that men can neither work nor fight to the 

 best advantage unless protected from in- 

 fectious and preventable diseases. The civil- 

 ized nation which will hereafter put an army 

 in the field or undertake a great engineering 

 problem without first preparing the way by 

 proper and adequate sanitary engineering and 

 equipment will be regarded by the other na- 

 tions as quite as foolish as a government 

 which would build a vast fleet of modern war- 

 ships and then arm them with the muzzle 

 loading ordnance of one hundred years ago. 

 An epidemic of typhoid fever in a military 

 camp should be considered a greater disgrace 

 to an army than a defeat in battle, since de- 

 feat may come in spite of the greatest exer- 

 tions and the highest wisdom, while typhoid 

 and yellow fever would be the result of ignor- 

 ance or disregard of well-known laws of pre- 

 vention. All nations will profit by the sani- 

 tary lesson of the Panama Canal. — Journal 

 of the American Medical Association. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 

 General Chemistry for Colleges. By Alex- 

 ander Smith. 8vo, pp. 529. New York, 

 The Century Co. 1908. 

 This book is practically a somewhat abbre- 

 viated and simplified edition of the author's 

 "Introduction to General Inorganic Chem- 

 istry" which appeared two years ago. The 

 " Introduction " attracted much attention 

 among teachers of chemistry, and received 

 high praise as an excellent and comprehensive 

 presentation of the subject, but it appears that 

 many teachers, while admiring the book as a 

 treatise, considered it too extensive and dif- 

 ficult for beginners, even at the age of college 

 students. 



It is evidently on account of these ob- 

 jections to the larger text-book that the shorter 

 work under consideration has been prepared. 



This is shorter to the extent of more than two 

 hundred pages, and it has been considerably 

 simplified, chiefly by omissions of less funda- 

 mental theoretical matter. It is to be ob- 

 served that the theoretical topics that have 

 been retained have been presented with the 

 same fullness as before, and that the aspect 

 of the new book in its arrangement and illus- 

 trations is very similar to that of the old one, 

 although some conspicuous changes have been 

 made in the presentation of some of the 

 theoretical topics, and other minor changes 

 and improvements have been introduced. 



It appears to be somewhat doubtful that the 

 present book will appeal to the majority of 

 those who considered the former book too dif- 

 ficult, because the chief changes are those of 

 omission, and they could be made easily while 

 using the larger book. 



There is evidently a tendency at the present 

 time to use less childish chemical text-books 

 for older students than was formerly the 

 custom, and this movement is undoubtedly an 

 excellent one, as far as the education of our 

 more capable students is concerned. There- 

 fore, the new book, by a teacher who has shown 

 such ability in test-book production, is to be 

 welcomed, although it may not be considered 

 entirely " easy," and it is to be hoped that we 

 shall soon have a revision of his " Introduc- 

 tion," which, whatever may be thought of it 

 for beginners, is a very useful book for more 

 advanced students. 



As a single criticism it may be said that 

 several of the brief statements in regard to 

 metallurgy need revision, even in the later 

 edition. This metallurgical weakness is a 

 very common fault in elementary text-books 

 of chemistry. 



H. L. Wells 



Thermodynamics of Technical Gas Reactions. 

 Seven Lectures. By Dr. P. Haber, Pro- 

 fessor at the Technische Hochsehule, Carls- 

 ruhe. Translated by Arthur B. Lamb, 

 Ph.D., Director of the Havemeyer Chemical 

 Laboratory, New York University. Pp. 

 356. London, Longmans, Green and Co. 

 1908. 

 Since Gibbs and Helmholtz showed that the 



